Fort Belvoir lauds partners at Community Relations Breakfast

Fort Belvoir leaders lauded the myriad partnerships that exist between the installation and the community Thursday during their annual Community Relations Breakfast.

Hosted by Garrison Commander Col. John Strycula, the annual event drew more than 200 to the Officers Club, where Strycula underscored Belvoir’s commitment to being a good neighbor to all of Northern Virginia.

“I’ve often said that I don’t believe Fort Belvoir is an island,” he said. “We have to be an integrated and integral part of Northern Virginia because we’re not on our own.”

Maj. Gen. Michael Linnington, commander of Joint Force Headquarters-National Capital Region and the Military District of Washington, agreed.

“I can tell you unequivocally that the relationship that Fort Belvoir, this leadership, has with community leaders, with elected leaders, is second to none.”

Strycula summarized his mission statement for the installation in simple terms: “I want it to be a great place to live, work and play,” he said.

Alluding to Base Realignment and Closure 2005, which brought thousands of new personnel, millions in infrastructure improvements and construction, and the newly opened Fort Belvoir Community Hospital to the installation, Strycula said that phase of Belvoir’s growth is now complete.

“As we move forward, the construction that happens now is longer BRAC,” Stycula said. “It’s now Fort Belvoir construction. As organizations complete their moves to Fort Belvoir and move the rest of their personnel to Fort Belvoir, they’re no longer BRAC organizations. They’re part of the Fort Belvoir family and part of the Fort Belvoir community.”

Strycula highlighted installation’s public-private partnership with Clarke Realty Capital, the company responsible for upgrading and building new family housing on Belvoir.

“I think we’ve got some of the greatest housing in the Department of Defense,” he said.

The installation boasts just over 2,100 homes, Strycula said. Almost 1,200 of those are newly built over the past eight years. In addition, almost 700 houses on Belvoir have undergone major renovation during that same timeframe.

Casey Nolan, Fort Belvoir Residential Communities LLC project director, said that when the partnership began in 2003, many of the installation’s homes were in dire need of being torn down, or in need of being redeveloped and renovated.

“Houses were about 60 to 70 percent occupied,” he continued. “People were choosing to live off post because the quality of housing wasn’t as good on post.”

Nolan said that today 99 percent of the homes on post are occupied, and 2,100 families call Fort Belvoir home. He also said that two homes in Woodlawn Village specifically built to accommodate wounded warriors and families with special needs

“We decided to re-invent handicapped accessible homes,” he explained. “We focused on wounded warriors and families with disability needs. We’ll be delivering these two homes in Woodlawn Village, on Veterans Day.”

One of the homes will be occupied, while the other will serve for a time as a model home, added Nolan.

Strycula then turned his attention to transportation, adding that too often when conversations about transportation and traffic begin they revolve solely around road improvements.

“Road improvements are one part of how we help manage traffic,” he acknowledged, “but, it’s not the only part. We’ve got to look at it with a holistic view.”

A part of that holistic view, he said, is decreasing the number of single-occupancy vehicles that travel to Belvoir. Strycula said the installation is encouraging mass transit and ride sharing. He also pointed out that a bus shuttle is now available to transport commuters from the King Street Metro Station in Alexandria to Mark Center with no intermediate stops.

Congressman Jim Moran promised he would continue the fight for additional monies for road improvements to help ease traffic congestion while pointing out how the military will continue to evolve in the years ahead.

“There’s going to be more emphasis on cyber security, more emphasis on intelligence, far more emphasis on foreign language and culture, training and technology,” he said. “We’ve got to stay at the cutting edge. We’ve got to defend this country.”

Strycula also lauded the installations fitness and youth sports programs and said that over the next two years five new child development centers will come online on post.